The 'Arrested Development' cast addressed the Jeffrey Tambor allegations, and it wasn't pretty

With Arrested Development Season 5 hitting Netflix this weekend, the cast has gathered to discuss (among other things) Jeffrey Tambor's bad behavior. And the result was uncomfortable as hell.

A little context: In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter addressing the sexual misconduct allegations that got him fired from Transparent, Tambor mentioned a "blowup" on the set of Arrested Development with Jessica Walter, who plays his wife.

At the time, Tambor did not go into detail and Walter declined to comment. But the topic came up again in a New York Times interview with both actors and their Arrested Development co-stars Jason Bateman, David Cross, Will Arnett, Tony Hale, and Alia Shawkat.

In it, Walter confirmed, through tears, that Tambor "harassed" her on set:

Let me just say one thing that I just realized in this conversation. I have to let go of being angry at him. He never crossed the line on our show, with any, you know, sexual whatever. Verbally, yes, he harassed me, but he did apologize. I have to let it go. [Turns to Tambor.] And I have to give you a chance to, you know, for us to be friends again.

It's clear that the moment bothered Walter – she added later that in "almost 60 years of working, I’ve never had anybody yell at me like that on a set." But not all of her co-stars seem to see it that way.

Bateman asserted that "we've all" lashed out on set; Hale concurred that "we've all had moments" while Cross added that Tambor's behavior was a result of a "cumulative effect" and "didn’t just come out of the blue."

To which Walter pointed out, multiple times, that they have never treated her the way Tambor did. (None of them contradicted her on that point.)

Throughout the interview, Bateman insists he's not trying to "belittle or excuse" Tambor's harassment of Walter, while doing just that. Here he is shortly before Walter's tearful comments:

Again, not to belittle it or excuse it or anything, but in the entertainment industry it is incredibly common to have people who are, in quotes, “difficult.” And when you’re in a privileged position to hire people, or have an influence in who does get hired, you make phone calls. And you say, “Hey, so I’ve heard X about person Y, tell me about that.” And what you learn is context. And you learn about character and you learn about work habits, work ethics, and you start to understand. Because it’s a very amorphous process, this sort of [expletive] that we do, you know, making up fake life. It’s a weird thing, and it is a breeding ground for atypical behavior and certain people have certain processes.

And here he is after Shawkat tries to point out that just because Tambor's behavior isn't uncommon in the industry, "that doesn't mean it's acceptable":

Again, there is context. What we do for a living is not normal, and therefore the process is not normal sometimes, and to expect it to be normal is to not understand what happens on set. Again, not to excuse it, Alia, but to be surprised by people having a wobbly route to their goal, their process — it’s very rarely predictable. All I can say, personally, is I have never learned more from an actor that I’ve worked with than Jeffrey Tambor. And I consider him one of my favorite, most valued people in my life.

Bateman's comments are especially frustrating because the fact that "difficult" behavior like Tambor's is common is exactly the problem.

All those stories coming out in recent months about how Hollywood turned a blind eye to abhorrent, entitled behavior from men like Harvey Weinstein? They got that far, in part, because their harassment and bullying were shrugged off as ordinary, acceptable behavior.

Hollywood as a whole may be in a new era of reckoning. But clearly, some men are still stuck in the past.

Brushoffs like Bateman's – and to a lesser extent, his other male co-stars' in this interview – are why victims struggle with coming forward when they're abused on set. They're how bullies and assaulters know that their toxicity will be tolerated, excused, normalized, and justified.

It's not the case that every single person needs to take a permanent hard-line stance against any colleague ever accused of doing anything bad. Walter herself says she's "let go" of her anger against Tambor, and that she'd "work with him again in a heartbeat."

But what Bateman is doing is different. He isn't so much trying to forgive or heal the toxic dynamic on set, as he is dismissing and downplaying Walter's complaints about that same dynamic.

Bateman does take a firm stand in this interview, and it's on Tambor's side. When Tambor says he hopes to return for Season 6, Bateman jumps in with, "Well, I won’t do it without you. I can tell you that," and says that there's "no reason" Tambor shouldn't be allowed to return.

Hollywood as a whole may be in a new era of reckoning. But clearly, some men are still stuck in the past.

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